tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30395167.post294603851248338186..comments2023-08-15T07:41:19.933-05:00Comments on <center>Slaves of Golconda</center>: "A bourgeois tragedy": Balzac, Eugénie GrandetQuillhillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07601080339912553168noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30395167.post-78126147652867026172015-04-01T19:05:31.037-05:002015-04-01T19:05:31.037-05:00It's so discouraging to hear that a book that ...It's so discouraging to hear that a book that one feels is only so-so is a certain author's best! I don't really want to read any further, after my second Balzac novel, although if someone I trust makes a compelling argument for why I should try a different one of his, I would listen. I do think EG would be worth a reread, as you say, though. But those early pages are such a challenge to get through! I am very much a fan of telling, as you are, and I'm fine with the method of opening with pages of exposition, but I just couldn't make sense of the exposition here -- I couldn't get a picture in my mind of what he was describing. I also like the twists the plot takes, and particularly where Eugenie ends up. I was afraid for a while that she was going to turn into another version of father, and in some ways she does -- in the way she doesn't spend money on herself and lives simply -- but she ends up living on her own terms. That is, on her own terms given the disappointments her life brought.Rebecca H.https://www.blogger.com/profile/10825532162727473112noreply@blogger.com